“The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice”: For “the righteous” see 10.6. “Will greatly rejoice” is an emphatic construction from the verb “to rejoice” in Hebrew; other ways of expressing it are “is filled with joy” (Scott), “has great joy” (New International Version), and “truly happy” (Contemporary English Version). The whole line is a roundabout way of saying “if a son is righteous, that will make his father very happy.” This is expressed in one translation as “A son whose way of life is straight, his father will be very happy because of him.”

“He who begets a wise son will be glad in him”: This repeats the sense of the previous line, and so some translations combine the two lines into one. “Begets” is not current English, and modern versions say something like “he who has a wise son. . .” (New International Version, Revised English Bible). “Be glad” renders a different Hebrew verb from that translated “rejoice” in the first line, but the meaning is the same. The sense of “be glad in him” is “be happy because of him” or perhaps “be proud of him.”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Proverbs. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2000. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .